My view on separating the art from the artist is that you cannot. Sure, you can watch a Woody Allen movie without thinking \u201cthe director has a history of sexually abusing his daughter,\u201d but buying a ticket for a movie he\u2019s involved in gives him more money, power, and opportunities to assault more women. Every novel read and every movie watched puts another dollar into the pocket of the artist. It gives that person more opportunity to abuse their power and exploit the people around them. I don\u2019t want to do what\u2019s easy\u2014I don\u2019t want to teach something written by someone who abuses their power just because it\u2019s canon\u2014I would much rather read 50 novels written by other people in order to find something that portrays the same themes\/messages.<\/p>\n
Additionally, I wanted to offer this perspective of a writer, Monique Laban, who is a woman of colour<\/a>. In the (short) essay, she talks about how much she loved, identified, and found value in\u00a0Diary<\/em>\u00a0before the statements of sexual assault came out.\u00a0I highly recommend reading the article, but here are some highlights:<\/p>\n I want to introduce these perspectives because I feel that it is important to reflect and have honest conversations with ourselves. As I mentioned in my previous post about passive allyship, I think it\u2019s important that we continually reflect. If we call ourselves feminists and say that we support the #MeToo movement, what are we telling these victims of sexual assault and other forms of power domination when we support these artists just because their art is canon?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" My view on separating the art from the artist is that you cannot. Sure, you can watch a Woody Allen movie without thinking \u201cthe director has a history of sexually abusing his daughter,\u201d but buying a ticket for a movie … Continue reading \n